MEDIA STATEMENT – 8 DECEMBER 2017

Kutana Group clarifies its position on Grinaker – LTA Empowerment Deal

She lives in a world dominated by danger, riddled with uncertainty. And yet despite the odds, she is a leader, a visionary, given to a keen understanding of teamwork, working without any fear of the sacrifices she needs to help her pride survive, and thrive.

The spirit of the lioness is at the heart of everything we do at Kutana. From humble roots we have risen to lead as a team of dedicated and empowered individuals, working together to secure the collective success of our stakeholders. In a male dominated world, Kutana has battled and won the respect of our peers, and today, we stand strong in defense and respect of our communities.

For our women, for our youth, for the underprivileged and uneducated, we dedicate our work to you. May our success become your success, and together we will bring great hope to the future of our beautiful country.

About Kutana Group

Black women-owned, our leadership group espouses a commitment to BEE and transformation. We are pioneered and steered by an experienced management group with more than 70 years’ combined experience in shaping successful investment companies across South Africa and Africa, delivering real value and measurable growth.

Our team of seasoned corporate professionals is recognised for its leadership and community roles throughout South Africa and Africa across a number of divergent sectors.

Our focus is on building sustainable growth through responsible investments and a commitment to the communities we work with and support.

Our Mission

Kutana is a Pan-African investment company focused on delivering significant shareholder value while contributing to the transformation of the economy and society at large.

THOKO MOKGOSI-MWANTEMBE

Thoko is the CEO and a founding member of the Kutana Group. Thoko has worked in executive positions in global pharmaceutical and ICT companies including CEO of Alcatel SA and Hewlett Packard SA. She currently holds a number of non-executive board positions for leading South African companies which include ABSA Bank, Vodacom group, AVENG group, Royal Bafokeng Platinum, Smollen group, Old Mutual and Chris Hani Baragwanath Hospital. She has received various awards such as South African Business Women of the year in 2007, IT businesswomen of the year and voted 2nd most influential women in Africa for IT, Media and Telecoms.

DR THABANG MOKOTELI

PhD (Finance, UK) MAcc (Accounting, USA) BComm (Accounting, Lesotho)

In Kutana she focuses on the financial overview and governance. Dr Thabang Mokoteli is a senior lecturer in Finance at Wits Business School (WBS), South Africa. Previously she was a Finance Officer at Standard Chartered Bank. She served as a non-executive director at Nozala Investments Ltd and Life’s Comfort Solutions. Currently, she serves as a non-executive director at StorTech (a subsidiary of Vodacom SA).

ANTHONY BARNARD

BCom CAIB (SA)

Anthony has extensive experience in the SA banking industry beginning his career in retail banking with his final positions being those in corporate and investment banking. He has extensive experience in the areas of structuring and funding of BEE transactions, development and management of Private Equity Funds and mergers and acquisitions. In addition to having held senior executive positions in Nedbank, Investec and ABN Amro Bank, Anthony has established a successful Pan-African consulting organisation providing credit, risk and management training and consulting to many of the South African and African Financial Institutions.

CLAIRE DU BOURG

B. Accounting (Honours) Stellenbosch CA(SA)

Claire’s focus is on driving acquisitions and investments for the Kutana Group within our defined industry sectors. Claire co-founded Crest Capital in 2014. Prior to this, Claire was a director in the corporate finance division at Grant Thornton Johannesburg where she headed up the transaction advisory function within the team. Claire has extensive experience in transaction advisory and M&A which includes buy-side and sell-side transaction structuring and various cross border transactions in a range of industry sectors.

LEBO SEPHOTI

Lebo is responsible for Business Development within the Steel and Mining portfolio. Her focus is to provide leadership in communications, marketing, sales and business development within the Steel and Mining business. Lebo has over 15 years of experience in various Engineering sectors such as; Foundries, Mineral Processing, Mechanical components, Dust-Extraction, Steel, and Lifting equipment.

Lebo previously worked for CMCO Material Handing SA, Columbus McKinnon Corporation as Executive Lead: Business Development, prior to this she worked for Aveng Steel for almost 7 years where she took on several Senior Management roles in Projects Sales and Business Development within the Aveng Steel cluster.

JANINE DE BRUYN

Janine has extensive experience in structuring and funding of BEE transactions, development and management of Private Equity Funds, mergers and acquisitions and development and management of Trusts/Consortia. She’s worked for Sanlam Investment Management and Futuregrowth where she managed development and private equity funds and was also MD of Sekunjalo Private Equity and Corporate Finance Director of Unipalm Investment Holdings. Janine holds a number of non-executive directorships and has established a consulting company offering advice on strategic private equity, BEE transaction structuring and corporate finance.

BRIDGET LEDWABA

Bridget is a talented, results-producing executive with a proven record of increasing the bottom line. In her previous role as Managing Director of Intertoll Africa she led geographic growth and market diversification of the business. She has over 14 years’ experience in general management, business development, sales & operations.

She has led successful teams in previous roles within Construction, Steel and Financial services.

The Kutana Team

Corporate Social Responsibility

The Kutana Group was proud to assist the community group called “Charity Begins With Me” over the Christmas period.

The group is based in Weltrevreden Park and is run by Stephen Ferreira who wanted to make a difference to his community after a cancer diagnosis in 2013.

Stephen’s group runs a feeding scheme for between 650 and 850 children from various informal settlements in Roodepoort, serving lunch each Sunday. The project started with 55 children in March but has since grown exponentially.

We at Kutana are committed to making an impact in the communities in which we work, so we were excited to join the children in their Christmas celebrations and sponsor a special day for them.